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Recent News

Annual General Meeting

The Annual General Meeting of the Nillumbik-Emus Orienteering Club will be
held on Sunday 25 November 2007 at Westerfolds Park in the OUTDOOR room,
part of the Parks Victoria suite of offices, at 1:30PM. Enter the park via
the main entrance in Fitzsimons Lane and bear right. After 350m or so
park at the far end of the public car park (on the left). The offices are
just across the road. There is an electric BBQ and picnic tables set
about amongst the buildings, and inside is a kitchenette.

Bring a picnic lunch and a serious expression. Arrive around 11AM for a quick
O-game followed by lunch. We anticipate our guest speaker at 1PM.

As usual there will be reports from the Treasurer and the President,
presentations to the VIN MALONEY TROPHY winners, and re-election of officers for
2008. No current committee members have announced their retirement, although
the newsletter editor position may still be on offer to a good home.

Please let us know if you are coming (by return mail) and/or if you want minutes
of the last AGM by email.

Recent Events

1st November - Eltham
Park/Street Event. Congratulations to Rod Lawlor who did such an
excellent job setting the first Northern Series course this year.
Recognising that the terrain was hilly and that we've had a few warm days of
late, Rod tempered his A-grade runner enthusiasm and planned a course that
would be fair and reasonable for the first event of the year.

This was an excellent course for a map that is often
very tough to run on. While the cool weather helped a little, the manner in
which the course was set made it possible for astute runners in all grades
to minimise the climb required - with A-grade being able to climb the
Eastern Hills once and then weave through a series of alley-ways and parks
to provide excellent route choice along the ridge line.

Wyndham Western Series -
congratulations to the Fell and Sunley families for getting their
mini-series, the Wyndham Super Six Series up and going. Our experience from
starting the training series last year (where only 7 turned up to the first
event - but now we average 35-40 per week), suggests that as the word gets
out smaller, highly localised series are an attractive means of meeting up
with friends and exercising in a friendly and mildly competitive
environment. Latest results (not yet published elsewhere are shown
below.

Nillumbik Emus in the Local Press

Congratulations to Club Publicity Officer, Phil Giddings,
in getting the following excellent article in the local press. This was a
feature article on orienteering, with colour pictures, that occupied two-thirds
of a page. Great job Phil!!

"Emus are hopping after navigating a 10th titleby Eliza Sewell

A Diamond Valley orienteering club has emerged as the
best in the state, but it's nothing new for the Nillumbik Emus Orienteering
Club. The Emus cololected the Victorian Club Champion's title - the
Rockhopper Trophy - for their performances during the winter season. It's
the 10th time that the club has collected the trophy in the 12 years that
the Emus have been competing in the championships.

Emu's Phil Gidding's said they held off teams from
Ballarat, Bendigo and the Yarra Valley to take out the overall award. The
Emus won on 1262 points, just 52 ahead of Ballarat and 88 ahead of Bendigo.
Giddings said it was a tight contest throughout the nine event season. "It's
a pretty big deal" Giddings said of the title win "...but it's not as if the
club dominated".

Up to 80 people take part in events in and around the
Diamond Valley, while across Melbourne about 500 participate each week; but
Giddings said that there was always room for more competitors. "It's
something we're trying to grow" he said. The great thing about it is it's a
running and walking sport. We have a walking class as well as a running
class, it keeps it (the sport) accessible for everyone.

The club's summer season is under way, with events
starting at 7pm each Thursday night in the DIamond Valley region. For more
information phone Geoff Hudson on 9888 8121.

Club Clothing

If you see someone in an Emu top that you don't know
please go over and introduce yourself
to them.

We now have boxes and boxes of the new tops - and they're
blocking access into my study ;-). In the Eastern and Northern Series, I'll be
contacting folks directly to offer them one of these superb (heavily subsidised)
running tops. New members that would like to find out about club tops
etc should contact Schon Hudson on 9888 8121 or at any event - or Fiona Shaw on
9749 4941 in the Western suburbs.

Emus Course-Setters for the Summer Series

Courses setters are required for the events being hosted
by NE over the coming Summer Series. I have a few names against events to start
with as a result of the first round of club bidding for events. Please assist if
can by placing the numbers 1 and 2 against events to indicate your 1st and 2nd
event preferences and then return to Ian Stirling (or call him on 9876 3643) -
we need to have course-setters in place for ALL events before the series starts.

Nillumbik Emus - a brief historyby Rob Edmonds

The club is in the process of collecting information
for a series of Club History pages on the web site. Rob Edmonds has kindly
provided the material below as an initial contribution and we invite others that
may have information and/or photographs of earlier times to let us use these as
part of this project.

The name Nillumbik comes from an Aboriginal word used by
the Wurundjeri people, thought to mean ‘shallow or dead earth’. This is
reflective of the general soil type and the relatively sparse vegetation of the
area. Though lacking in plant foods, the open ground reputedly was good for
hunting. The area now comprising the Shire of Nillumbik was roamed for centuries
by the Wurundjeri-willam clan of the Woi wurrung speaking people. The Woi
wurrung territory encompassed the watersheds of both the Yarra and Maribyrnong
Rivers and thus occupied much of present-day Melbourne. A number of
archaeological sites remain as evidence of Aboriginal custodianship of much land
within the Shire, and the Wurundjeri are recorded as having co-existed with the
early white squatters and selectors.

Another more recent interpretation of the word Nillumbik
is 'Go and Get Lost'. Nillumbik was adopted as the name of the club when Eltham
College wished to broaden their appeal.

There have been many mergers and associations over the
years. Latrobe University Mountaineering Club was an original member of the VOA.
Latrobe Mountaineering Club ‘Leadbeaters’ was formed from ex-LUMC members and
some of its members joined the newly formed Nillumbik OC in 1985 when LMC was no
longer able to run orienteering events. The Latrobe University and
Greendale/Blackwood maps were made by LMC.

When the Geelong Orienteering Club disbanded, some of its
members joined Nillumbik and the You Yangs became one of our maps. This map was
used by Nillumbik for the Australian Club Relays in 1985 as part of the World
Championships Carnival, an event which attracted over 900 participants.

Emus comes from the name of one of the original clubs in
Victoria to join organised orienteering Melbourne University Mountaineering Club
(MUMC). When the orienteering group became an entity in itself, it became Ex-MUMC
or EMU. The present name resulted from an amalgamation of the two clubs at the
end of 1993.

St Leo’s / Navigators, itself an amalgamation had
previously joined Emus. One of their orienteering areas, Bungal, is still
popular. Vin Maloney ran the O’Shop for many years. His son, Kevin took that
over and the club has set the annual Vin Maloney Trophy as its handicap event
for best club orienteer each year.

Eltham College ‘St Georges Lake’, MUMC ‘Borhoney Ghurk’
and Latrobe ‘Greendale’ organised events for the 1981 Christmas 6 days
Orienteering Carnival which attracted orienteers from right around the world.

The successful Rockhoppers club merged with Nillumbik Emus
in 1995 as the demands for organising orienteering events became more time
consuming. The Rockhopper Trophy for Champion Victorian Club was created in 1995
and Nillumbik Emus have won 10 of the 12 trophies.

Please let Rob know if you would like to course set,
organize or control an event on this fixture.
You can also learn the ropes by assisting in these roles. If you have never
course set or organized a bush event before and would like to have a go please
contact Rob at redm4896@bigpond.net.au or
Ph. 9438 3378.